Mozart, Bernstein – DONE!

Whew! Three months of work came to fruition last night in front of an almost-full house at the fabulous Troy Music Hall.

I’ve been saying all along that the difficult first half of Raminsh and Bernstein – lots of meter changes, lots of careful and delicate phrasing, way too much fast Hebrew, and difficult balancing of forces – would make the more familiar and straightforward Mozart Requiem seem like coming home to an old friend.

That was certainly the case last night. The first half was terrific, I thought, with terrific expression in the stunningly beautiful Raminsh pieces and the combination of beauty and frenetic ecstasy of Chichester Psalms. But the Mozart was at another level. It was easier, but that’s because these singers and players knew every note and understood every phrase and made it unbelievably exciting.

I will remember some stunning moments, when the performers were just magical. The end of the Confutatis, the Lacrymosa, the Hostias – those are the moments requiring great heart. The Dies Irae and Domine Jesu Christe, requiring great drama. The final fugue and the incredible last note, an open fifth, absolutely raw Mozart.

I don’t mean to be tooting my own horn here; I do lots of concerts where I don’t feel this way about the performances! (I’d love to hear you reactions to the concert, here on the blog or directly to janower@albany.edu.)

I keep thinking of our dozen high school apprentices who joined us for this. Can you imagine what it’s like to be 17 and a singer even in one of the best high school choirs (and we have several really fine HS choirs locally, as we all know), and then suddenly you are doing a Mozart Requiem in a fabulous hall that might turn out to be one of the best performances of your life? What an opportunity.

I’m so proud of my singers, and so grateful for their hard work and fine singing, for putting up with me week after week, and for their great hearts. You can lead a singer to Mozart, but you can’t give them heart if they don’t have it already; you just give them room to show it. And man, did they show it.

8 Responses

I didn’t get a chance to see you after the performance, Prof. Janower, but congratulations! This was my first trip to Troy Music Hall, my first Albany Pro Musica concert, and the first time I have heard Mozart Requiem in person, and I was overjoyed.

Fabulous! I loved it! We enjoyed the pre-concert talk as well.
My wife, who is not usually a classical music fan, especially enjoyed the Raminsh and Bernstein.
The only down side I can think of was the, I felt, disappointing Baritone soloist.

My husband and I attended, he being an alum of BHBL, class of ’74, so he wanted to hear his alma mater’s choir, of which he was a member (tenor).

The voices in the opening measures of the Raminsh Ave Verum Corpus sounded like something out of the Sound of Music.

We also agree with the last comment made by the third post. However, the soprano and alto soloists were terrific with the alto doing slightly better, in our opinion, than the soprano (and I’m a soprano, so we can be objective). I never tire of hearing the Dies Irae. Done correctly, the opening chord (Di of Di-es)can cause your heart to skip a beat, which it did for me.

You know, I was irritable all Saturday evening, and I finally realized it was because I wished I were at Troy Music Hall hearing you all sing! Next year I will put at least one APM concert on a highter priority than my children’s activities!